Pete,
Thanks for organizing this event! It was a lot of fun here in Colorado. Having so many AZ stations on was great, but propagation from here was mostly on 40M and 30M, so only some of your summits were workable up here.
This event drew many activators from other regions onto the bands, and many of these provided good S2S contacts as well. As usual, I was both an activator and a chaser, so I made a variety of contacts on 40-30-20M CW. I never tried SSB, which was surely a mistake. I was pretty busy, and it was both interesting and fun!
I was on W0C/SR-052, Thorodin Mountain at 10,541 feet, on the air for 4+ hours, running my KX2 at 10W, with a 66 foot end-fed wire at 20 feet, and I logged:
29 S2S contacts
25 S2S contacts with points
12 AZ unique S2S contacts with points
11 AZ unique S2S contacts on 10-point peaks
111 AZ S2S points
185 Total S2S points
Usually I get some S2Sâs when calling CQ and working the piles, and then I get more by tuning around and hunting for stations calling CQ and working their piles. In general, large piles work against making S2S contacts, but itâs also important to be audible and to get spotted - the S2S game is somewhat complex, so thatâs part of the fun.
S2S chasing adds a lot of challenges and rewards to SOTA activating, but it also adds complexity and often frustration, so itâs not for everyone. Iâm totally addicted to it, because it gets more interesting the more I do it. S2S points are worth much more to me than activator points. Of course, this is irrationalâŚ
S2S chasing is real SOTA chasing. You have an enormous advantage on RF-quiet summits - you can hear activators that many chasers cannot. However, you have much less power and fewer tools than at a home station. Therefore listening and timing really matter. You are actually competing with your own chasers for contacts with other activators! Some of these chasers will clobber you, while most will actually help you out! You get lots of chaser points as well as S2S points, if you submit your logs correctly. The game gets more interesting as you progress.
I have three comments on S2S in general:
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We need to send our calls and our SOTA Refs more often on CW. This helps everyone - this is especially true in a big event with lots of stations on.
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Many possible S2S contacts are missed - you canât get them all, no matter what you do.
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Many incredibly weak contacts can be made, if both operators are skilled and patient.
If you use a smartphone with access to spots (I DO NOT generally do this), you will find more S2S contacts, but youâll burn operating time looking at the display and trying to get coverage; youâll also miss contacts not spotted or not spotted yet. Youâll also waste time trying to hear and work stations with too-poor propagation.
I miss a lot of S2S contacts while Iâm calling CQ and the other guy is calling CQ on a different - or the same - band. I never hear him, he never hears me, and itâs just a miss. Seeing the spots might help avoid many of those misses, but it would mean abandoning chasers in the middle of a run - not nice.
If everyone did more listening and a little less calling, we would have more S2S contacts. Listen to several bands before calling CQ the first time. Listen to all three bands 40-30-20 between runs on each band. Listen again before deciding to QRT - take a short break and listen again.
Spend more time on your summit. You donât get SOTA points for quick activations. Call CQ a second time on 40-30-20 - surprises and miracles happen!
I miss some S2S contacts because I canât copy the other activator! Some weak signals are due to poor propagation, and local noise or QRN can hide signals, but some activators have weak signals. They use inefficient antennas, lossy matching networks, donât try to put out strong signals. Their RBN spots tell the story. I guess they donât want to log a lot of chasers. When I look at other activatorsâ logs, I wonder how some of them could have so few contacts, with so many chasers out there trying to work them! As an S2S chaser, this is very frustrating!
For sure, most of the AZ stations I heard in the S2S event were VERY strong, and many sounded like they were chasers at their home stations! It seems like many activators went to extra trouble to do a good job for this S2S extravaganza!
Thank you all - 73!
George (Carey)
KX0R